Justos - The Origin Story

Antonio, Jorge and I recently started a company together. It's called Justos, and it's an insurtech startup focused on the Latin American market. This post is about how it all came together, what drove our decision making and how we think about company building.

By no means is this

1. An exhaustive list of anything
2. A manual
3. A playbook
4. A how-to

Rather, it's meant to

1. Offer some insight ?? that might be helpful to other founders as they consider the existential who, what, where, when and how questions about starting a company.
2. Give a tiny glimpse into what kind of people we are for those of you who might want to be a part of this journey with us.

Here we go!

?? Start with who

Above anything else, my co-founders decided that we wanted to work together. At the time, we had no ideas about what to build, no specific insights about users, and no clear mission about what we wanted to change in the world. As serial entrepreneurs, we had all come to believe that perhaps the most important thing about creating a start-up is facing and overcoming challenges together with amazing people by your side.

No problems are insurmountable when you have the right team, and success has no meaning if you have no one to share it with.

Image credit: Michel Bachmann

There are many good reasons to start a company — scratching one's own itch, stumbling upon an insight, deep sectoral experience that allows for a unique point of view, singular obsession with improving upon a sub-optimal status quo, among others.

In our case, being on a meaningful journey with an exceptional group of people came first. To read more about starting with who, and how it borrows and contrasts from the more famous Start With Why by Simon Sinek, check out this article.

?? Focus on problems and on learning

Once we had committed to building something together, we had to figure out the why (the “problem”), what and how. A lot of founders make the mistake of confusing their startup's success with their life's purpose. This makes the stakes of success very high and if the company fails, the founder considers it a personal failure since his/her identity is so intricately tied up with the company.

You have to constantly remind yourself that your startup and product idea are just that: a startup and product idea. They are not the sum total of your life's work, nor are they in any way representative of your self-worth.

I can speak from personal experience that getting your ego entangled with the outcome of your company is dangerous territory that makes failure bitter and pivoting very difficult, instead of both of those being learning opportunities to approach with a growth mindset.

We believe that a more helpful attitude in our experience is to focus passionately on identifying important problems and building innovative solutions, but distancing yourself from the outcome. Ultimately, there are too many things that are out of our control; like luck, timing, competitors and regulation to name a few.

The real long term value of building a business lies just as much in the learning and enjoying the ride as it does in the traditional metrics of success.

We all wanted to do something that improved lives for people in the developing world. Given our experience working in Latin America, that region was the obvious choice. We were also all interested in improving the quality and accessibility of financial services and healthcare. Within fintech and healthtech however, we had no specific insights or ideas. But that didn't matter, because we knew we had to look for fast moving water.

?? Fast moving water

I first heard about "fast moving water" from James Currier over at NFX. Building a company is hard enough work, James would say, so make sure that you are working on something where there aren't additional hurdles like macro-economic headwinds or other barriers that are outside of your control. Pick something that gets you excited, that gets investors excited and that has as many tailwinds as possible so that your job as a founder is at least a little bit easier.

“If you aren’t in the fast moving water, you’re in the wrong place”.

― James Currier

Of course, this approach only works if you are flexible around what you might want to build. This is not always the case and if you have strong conviction about something very specific, you should probably lead with that. Having said that, even when you have strong conviction, I'm of the opinion that you should hold it lightly as you might be wrong and you don't want the stakes to be too high — both personally, and professionally — when you have your back against the wall and need to pivot.

?? Insurance

So after going through about 50 different ideas and seeing how each of them stacked up against our criteria, we decided to go with insurance, starting with auto insurance in Brazil.

Road accidents are amongst the top 10 causes of death in most countries around the world (source). In Brazil, they account for around 50,000 deaths (in addition to many more injuries) every year.

And yet, over 70% of vehicles are not insured and 85% of Brazilians do not have life insurance. The combination of high casualties and low coverage means that Brazilians are exposed to significant fear and risk every time they commute.

The more we researched the market in Brazil, the more we discovered inefficiencies in pricing, distribution and claims handling, very similar to what the retail banking industry looked like before Nubank came along. As we spoke with uses, investors and industry insiders, we felt like we were onto something. With our initial hunch confirmed, we were off to the races.

?? Practice precedes passion, passion precedes purpose

But why a tech startup at all, you might ask? Why not a restaurant, Netflix mini series, permaculture village, punk rock band or any other creative endeavor? Well, because we know a thing or two about building startups because we've been doing it for 5-10 years.

The more we practice, the better we get. The better we get, the more moments of flow state we experience, which in turn makes it more fun, engaging, and meaningful for us. And those feelings and states are all contagious — the more passionate and purposeful our lives, the more we can rub off on those around us.

“Don’t ask what the world needs. Ask what makes you come alive, and go do it. Because what the world needs is people who have come alive.”

― Howard Thurman

?????♀? Personal and collective growth

Building a company is an extremely difficult endeavor — enough for most people to wonder whether entrepreneurs are masochists. Why would someone want to do something so difficult and with such low chances of success? One reason that we've found that has resonated a lot with us is because it builds character and helps accelerate personal growth. The minute we are required to lead people, we feel challenged to learn how to do it well. We feel a sense of commitment towards the people who are trusting us by joining our team. Wanting to make good on that trust becomes a responsibility, at least for us. Without that forcing function, it would be much less likely that we would learn how to do that. When we take the path less traveled, we build character, evolve our mental models and set ourselves up for better outcomes.

When you make hard choices, suffer through difficult times and then come out the victor, you feel more driven to support other people do the same. You gain in both wisdom and empathy, and you want to pay it forward. Towards the tail end of my last startup journey, I (Dhaval) got certified as a coach and have found that supporting people on their professional and personal development is one of the most gratifying things that I might ever do in my life. Building a company gives me the opportunity to help people see the greatness in themselves, and then offer them the space to grow into that greatness.

“Leadership is communicating to people their worth and potential so clearly that they are inspired to see it in themselves.”

— L. David Marquet

?? Startups are like sports teams

Entrepreneurship (and for that matter, investing) are gamified. There are teams, there are rules, there are objectives, there are challenges and levels and rewards. And whether we like it or not, we are involved in the gameplay every day of our lives. We don't mean to make light of the very real consequences that come from bankruptcies, unbridled competition, corporate greed, frivolous lawsuits or any other failing mechanism of the capitalist construct.

Rather, what I mean is that thinking about like a sports team provides some insight into why it can be so appealing. Hiring a top class team is like acquiring or developing talent at Liverpool FC.

Coaching players to play their best is similar to motivating a team to do work that makes them proud. Achieving product-market fit is like winning a league title. Building a long lasting and impactful career is like winning the World Cup many times over.

And most of all, playing is fun because you are challenging yourself, collaborating with others, competing with yet others, and progress and success are measurable (socially, financially, environmentally, etc).

?? Meaning

Ultimately, we have chosen to embark on a journey that provides us meaning, belonging and purpose. We are dreamers and seekers, but also creators and operators. We like finding the intersection of opportunity and impact. We like building teams that build character and careers. We like challenges, whether we overcome them or not. Because hard times create strong minds and soft hearts.

We have chosen the bold mission of building a safer world and helping people live life to the fullest.

And we are hiring :)

www.justos.com